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Wednesday, July 29, 2015

Where's Peara? Classic TV 'You're Gonna Make it After All'

Where's Peara now? Here's a hint: "You're gonna make it after all!"

OK, that's not much of a hint if you are of the younger generation.

For those of you new to Peara's adventures, let me introduce you.

Peara is a stuffed, plush, yellow pear with googly eyes. We received her from my sister-in-law years ago, even before we had children, I believe. See, she was going through her kids' toys and Peara was about to take a visit to Goodwill. Before this happened, my sister-in-law asked if we would by any chance be interested in finding a home for Peara. And, the rest is history.

Well, almost history...

As we began traveling with our children, we sort of adopted this plump yellow pear as our travel with kids mascot. And, thus began our journey of "Where's Peara?"

This is the Minneapolis, Minnesota skyline.

We were fascinated to discover there are rows of fresh produce on Hennepin Avenue, right in the heart of downtown.

But, what we drove into the city to see was the Mary Tyler Moore statue.

TV Land dedicated a statue to the classic TV show that was originally aired in the 70's. It featured Mary Tyler Moore as a single woman trying to make it on her own in the big city. She landed a job in a local newsroom, and the sitcom was born.

The statue depicts her throwing her hat up in the air after she crosses a busy intersection. I don't know if it's hearsay fable or real, but I was once told that she spontaneously threw her hat at the last minute when they were filming, and they used it as a segment in the intro. with the theme song playing, "You're gonna make it after all." Mary turns and tosses her hat. It became iconic.

The surrounding buildings were interesting as well and some are shown in the opening song for the show.